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Halp:Flags
Flags is a beta feature, currently under evaluation, which improves the way page-top notices behave on Wikia. With Flags, these notice templates, such as "this article needs clean-up" or "this article contains spoilers" are separated from the article's wikitext and managed by their own tool. This allows for a variety of benefits, including: ; On-article flag assignment * Faster flagging & unflagging — no edit mode required * Easier addition, removal, and modification by new contributors — no need to remember template names and parameter ordering * Addition, removal, and modification of flags via the mobile skin * Ability to set more descriptive flag names ; Article management * Easy-to-spot flagging via log entries in RecentChanges * lists based on flag usage. ; Display options * Set which flags are visible to only contributors vs. all readers * Flag content doesn't get crawled by on-Wikia and external search engines * Flags render better on mobile devices and in apps How does it work? Flagging or unflagging an article The flags dialog allows users to add or remove flags from an article or update the contents of any template parameter. The flags dialog can be accessed on any article page via an option on the 'Edit' button drop-down. Alternatively, hovering over any existing flags pops up an 'Edit flags' link. Changes to flags appear as a Log on and . Flag behavior By default, flags appear at the very top of an article. Using the variable __FLAGS__ in the article's wikitext allows for more specific positioning of flags if necessary. Flags that are targeted to 'Readers' will display to everybody - for example, a Spoiler template. Flags that are targeted to 'Contributors' will display only to logged-in users - for example, a 'Citations Needed' template. Flag permissions Permissions for changing flags on articles follows the same permissions as editing the article itself (e.g. a page locked to admin-only editing will not allow non-admins to change the flags). Administrators can add, modify, or delete flags via Special:Flags. Managing flags Creating a new flag Admins can either add a brand-new flag or chose to migrate an existing page-top notice template to a flag. Both are created in the same method. To get started, visit Special:Flags and click the 'Create a new Flag' button. You'll be able to define the following information for each flag: * Flag name — The name that appears in the flags dialog. * Template name — The template to display on the article page, when flagged. * Group — The general purpose of the flag. Options include: spoiler, disambig, canon, stub, delete, improvements, status, and other. * Targeting — The intended audience for this flag. Either 'Contributors', which will only display to logged-in users, or 'Readers', which will display to everybody. * Parameters — Details of all the parameters the template uses. When 'Save' is clicked, every use of the provided template will be converted to a flag via User:WikiaBot (a bot). If the template provided is not used or does not yet exist, the flag will still be created but not automatically added to any articles. Updating flag settings Admins can modify any existing flags at Special:Flags. Click the 'Edit' button at the far right side of the row to modify any information about the flag in the same dialog. When a template associated with a flag is edited, any edits to the available template parameters will automatically update and affect the flag's parameters. For example, Flags will automatically identify any parameters added to the template. Conversely, removing a parameter from a template will remove the parameter from the flag and delete the parameter values on all flagged articles. This action cannot be undone. Deleting a flag On Special:Flags, admins can click the trashcan icon on the row of the flag they want to delete. Confirming the action will remove the flag from all articles. This action cannot be undone. What's the status of this feature? As this feature is in early development, major changes and new features are likely as it is tested, and as we receive feedback on it. Coming soon: * More details about how you can test out this feature on your community! Advanced notes * A little background on flag conversion: ** Only templates that have been defined as flags are affected, and only if they are used in the first section of a page. ** On enabling Flags: when the feature is enabled, a script is run to convert existing pages to use to the new feature. Edits are performed by User:WikiaBot (a global bot). * Flags can be modified on the Monobook skin via a 'Flags' tab, next to the 'History' tab. * Detailed API notes for the Flags feature can be found on Halp:Flags/API. Further help and feedback Category:Help Category:Editing